Hallway Diaries by Felicia Pride

Author:Felicia Pride
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Kimani Press
Published: 2007-08-16T04:00:00+00:00

At lunchtime, I grabbed an empty table. I created a protective fortress of textbooks and notebooks so it didn’t feel like I was sitting alone. If I’d had my stuffed teddy bear, I would have been clutching it for dear life. But this would have to do for now.

“The freshmen don’t have their lunch hour until next period, which means you must be a new student here.” I looked up from my turkey sandwich to see a blond celeb clone standing over my Fort Knox of books.

“Y-yeah, I’m new—I mean, new to you,” I began clumsily. “Mia,” I told her.

“Mia.” She tried it out. I could tell she’d expected me to have a more ethnic-sounding name. “Mia,” she repeated, but this time giving it an unmistakable edge. “I’m Jennifer Octavian—junior class,” she announced as if her name were in lights and “junior class” were some blockbuster feature film. “You just moved to town?” she asked.

“No, I’m from East Orange—I transferred from City High.”

Bingo. Jennifer’s eyes widened with new interest—just when she was going to write me off as boring.

“East Orange City High, as in True MC?” Jennifer was obviously intrigued. She raised a freshly waxed eyebrow. Bibi had taught me how to detect what she called people’s “lightning”—the body language that comes before the thunder of the voice. For example, when I snacked on animal crackers around Stacie, the corner of her mouth would quiver before she asked, “Ca-I-avesum?”—Stacie-ese for “Can I have some?” And my dad almost always smoothed his goatee when he was about to debate you on your last point. So I braced for Jennifer’s thunder once her eyebrow rose and twitched.

“Well,” she began with a twinkle in her eye. “Big change from metal detectors and random locker searches, huh?”

“That’s not—” I started.

“Mia, hey!” Allie the artist moseyed up to the table, tray in hand.

“Hi.” I was glad to see her. I slid my pile of books over, beckoning her to have a seat.

“Oh, so you two know each other?” Jennifer looked disappointed. Maybe it wasn’t badass enough for someone from East Orange. I wasn’t sorry to let her down.

Allie and I both shot her a blank look.

“So, Mia—anytime you want to run your ‘true life story’ by me—” Jennifer held up her fingers to mime air quotes “—I’d love to hear it. See you around.”

“Who is she now, Barbara Walters? What did she mean by that?” Allie was confused.

“She thinks the rapper True MC and I have more in common than our mutual hometown.” I watched Jennifer join a table of ultra trendy girls. While they leaned in to hear what she had to tell them, they cast occasional glances at me. “I transferred here from East Orange City High,” I explained to Allie.

“I haven’t proven it yet, but I’m pretty sure Jennifer Octavian is an embedded tabloid reporter working for the St. Claire Dish or some kind of gossip rag.” Allie picked the onions out of her sandwich. The blue paint from this morning was now completely washed from her hands.

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